HUGHES The Private Diaries, Memos and Letters

Richard Hack gives us a brilliant portrait of America's first billionaire, painting the life of the legendary man who was at once an aeronaut, film producer, playboy, and recluse. Despite the book's subtitle, this reading has very little in the way of diary, memo, or personal correspondences. What it does provide is a fascinating, perplexing, sometimes disturbing portrait of Howard Hughes. Dan Cashman's reading is welcoming and unobtrusive, although at times it comes across as weary. Cashman reads in a strict documentary style that sometimes belies the lifestyle of the dramatic and paradoxical Hughes as he passes between lucidity and madness--from sexual promiscuity to a phobic avoidance of people, daylight, and germs. A fascinating, captivating listen. S.E.S. (c) AudioFile 2001, Portland, Maine [Published: DEC/ JAN 02]